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[NW_Kohaku]

What? I was just pointing out that NW_Kohaku has posted a lot of words.

It would be more productive if Kohaku were to write a novel, instead of pissing his time away posting on a message board.

The income from the novels could be used to pay a programmer to write a new game exactly to Kohaku's specifications. Just sayin'.

Did you ever stop to consider that talking and making persuasive arguments for random topics on a forum is what I do for fun?  (Aside from reading various non-fiction - learning something new is the only thing more fun than talking about what you learned.) The more my arguments get challenged, the more I can refine my arguments and find better ways to persuade.

Incidentally, isn't Fahrenheit 451 a short story?  Improved Farming's is... 43,364 for the main argument, not counting the responses to posts.  That was only 60 pages in Word.  Seems short for a novel.

Besides, if the only thing you have to say about my argument is that I'm making a thorough argument, it seems like it's an argument I must be winning, especially if you think my writing is compelling enough that you believe I could become rich if I just took it up professionally. 

NW_Kokaku wants his final idea for the game regardless of others opinions and intends to convert everyone else to his view and only his view, that will naturally draw some hostility.

Myself and several others have spent several pages trying to come to a halfway point, not eliminating his ideas, but compromising. He has not budged one inch.

so I must ask you how disrespectful one can really be to somebody who shows this behavior in every thread I have ever seen him post in?

Hypothetically, you can be as disrespectful to me as anyone else.  There is no correlation between the two.

Besides which, I don't see much good faith effort here for you to "compromise" - I have told you time and again that anything that makes removal of rubble overly easy or makes rubble in general overly valuable detracts from the purpose that it brings.  And your "compromises" are punctuated with accusations like these, at that, which wouldn't exactly put anybody in a "negotiating" mood. 

NW_Kokaku wants his final idea for the game regardless of others opinions and intends to convert everyone else to his view and only his view

That is not an unreasonable imposition on my part.  That is essentially just the literal definition of persuasive argument rewritten to bear the connotation of an insult or accusation.

Furthermore, I don't see how it is "disrespectful" to argue for a position.  In what way is arguing for what I believe an insult to anybody?  You act as though I owe it to you to give up my positions.  That's not how this works.

Or, to be more precise about it, we are both attempting to make persuasive arguments, and I am not being persuaded by your arguments... so you are trying to turn the fact that you haven't managed to persuade me into an insult against me.  And frankly, trying to insult me is an even less effective technique of persuasive argument than what you have been doing.

If you want me to change my opinions on the matter, come up with something that is a superior idea.  I am fine with very limited ability to extract some extra ores or something slightly useful like sand out of rubble, so long as it does not destroy rubble itself.  The idea behind rubble takes that it fills up space and requires logistics to deal with.  Rubble doesn't need any purpose beyond the need to be disposed of, as I have said time and time again, and which you, yourself, are not moving on. (And no, I don't think you owe it to me to move on that.)  Just as contaminants and the nervous systems or the old chunks from butchering had no "use", to a fortress, some items in the game can exist just to be a problem.

As people have pointed out, yourself included, anything less than 1:1 rubble will just result in people exploiting this by mining out more extra tiles to fill up with the excess rubble, and as such, only 1:1 rubble retains the meaning rubble is supposed to have.  (You've done a very effective job convincing me not to move from that, I should point out.)

The fact is, most of these "compromises" you try to offer up completely miss the point of what I'm after: I want an object that is difficult to dispose of, I don't want something called "rubble" because I think it's a really cool word.  If you try to bring up a "compromise" that takes away the things I want out of rubble, why are you surprised when I refuse?  That's why I've been repeating my outlook on this time and again in response to you - you just aren't understanding my position, so obviously, I need to try explaining it to you in another manner.

[The Bard]

Maybe if you could build 'natural' walls with it, I might be convinced that it was worth putting up with slower mining.

But otherwise, this adds nothing for me. I have enough trouble coming up with enough time for DF as it is, and I'm not in it for patience challenges or simulation. I just wanna make my animal !!SCIENCE!! forts and aboveground castles with massive, deadly arenas and this would just result in making my arenas probably no longer worth the headache.

And don't tell me that's not a game. It's my game. It's my fun.

[NW_Kohaku]

Maybe if you could build 'natural' walls with it, I might be convinced that it was worth putting up with slower mining.

But otherwise, this adds nothing for me. I have enough trouble coming up with enough time for DF as it is, and I'm not in it for patience challenges or simulation. I just wanna make my animal !!SCIENCE!! forts and aboveground castles with massive, deadly arenas and this would just result in making my arenas probably no longer worth the headache.

And don't tell me that's not a game. It's my game. It's my fun.

Again, I think it's worth as much of an option to turn it off as eating, sleeping, sieges, mineral scarcity, or all the other game features that slow the game down and force you to build systems to compensate. 

I also think "natural" rubble/amalgam/gravel walls are what should be created, although I would still also like constructed walls of rock blocks to be engravable.

Again, nothing is being taken away from anyone here, so I don't see why people seem to take this idea as a personal insult.  You can still have fun doing construction set type activities with all the options on or off you personally choose to have, just as you can personally choose to have SPEED:0 dwarves and use danger rooms or else impose self-imposed limits like not using any traps or walling anything in and building on the surface for more challenge with sieges.

[Graknorke]

I wasn't thinking of compressing it exactly, something more along the lines of Gabions than straight up compressing it into blocks.
They would probably require some rope or chain.

[Arkenstone]

Some parts of this thread are beginning to smoulder...


I believe it was suggested either here or in the other thread to make all rocks smeltable?

Well, it might of been said already but that might be out of the tech range.  If I'm not mistaken, the process involves electrolysis.

[Mudcrab]

Yeah if its toggle-able who really gives a shite

[NW_Kohaku]

I wasn't thinking of compressing it exactly, something more along the lines of Gabions than straight up compressing it into blocks.
They would probably require some rope or chain.

Perhaps making a reaction that turns one metal bar and two tiles worth of rubble into three Gabion wall blocks? 

It could work, but from a gameplay perspective, I don't think we really even need more things to build walls with.  Just carrying wood or stone and making walls from those is just as effective and removes the need for an intermediary industrial step.  As long as rubble can fill in walls, as well, there wouldn't be much reason to go to the trouble.

I believe it was suggested either here or in the other thread to make all rocks smeltable?

Well, it might of been said already but that might be out of the tech range.  If I'm not mistaken, the process involves electrolysis.

The problem with smelting is that such projects eliminate the rubble, which completely removes its point in existing - it would only be conducive to the main point of rubble if you were still stuck with the rubble afterwards and still needed to find a way to get rid of it.

Besides which, every stone in the fortress shouldn't have iron in it.  We have geologic layers for a reason.

[Sadrice]

Some parts of this thread are beginning to smoulder...


I believe it was suggested either here or in the other thread to make all rocks smeltable?

Well, it might of been said already but that might be out of the tech range.  If I'm not mistaken, the process involves electrolysis.

I don't think they meant that they would be extracting the metals that make up the rock itself, those are in oxidation states that are not easily alterable, but small quantities of ore in the rock itself.  I support this, in a limited sense (should not be all or even most rock that can be used), but it makes no sense for this to actually eliminate the rubble.  The reaction should take the rubble, and produce the same amount of rubble and an insignificant quantity of whatever metal.

[Martin]

The problem with smelting is that such projects eliminate the rubble, which completely removes its point in existing - it would only be conducive to the main point of rubble if you were still stuck with the rubble afterwards and still needed to find a way to get rid of it.

Besides which, every stone in the fortress shouldn't have iron in it.  We have geologic layers for a reason.

I think you're falling into a logical trap there. Smelting rubble would only be viable if you had access to magma due to its low yield. But if you have access to magma, you already have a solution to the rubble - just toss it in the magma. If you take that as the default solution when magma is available, then smelting doesn't change anything - except give you the ability to trade labor for a bit of metal.


And clearly you didn't read my explanation for how it'd work. I said quite explicitly that my proposal would give out metal in proportion to its existence in the biome layer. If there's no iron in the layer, you get no iron. Let me make it clearer: if you excavate every tile in the layer, the amount of metal you would get from smelting all of the non-ore in the entire layer would be identical to the amount of metal you would get from smelting the ore from that layer. So if you excavate 10,000 stone from a single layer of a 100x100 tile embark (about a 2x2) and you get 200 copper ore and 100 silver out of it, and therefore 200 copper bars and 100 silver - if you smelted the remaining 9700 stone as gravel, you'd get an additional 200 bars of copper and 100 silver. It'd require 32x as much labor and fuel to double your yield. With magma, the fuel is free, but the labor remains. If you think that's a good deal - then go for it. But instead of 9700 hauling/dump jobs to the magma, you'd generate 9700 furnace operator jobs to the same magma, plus 300 hauling jobs for the resulting bars. You run into a parallellization problem that you don't have with the dumping in that you can probably task 50 dwarves with dumping, but you're unlikely to have 50 magma smelters constructed and 50 furnace operators. In that case, in order to clear you fortress, you're probably facing 9700 hauling jobs to clear, and an additional 9700 smelting jobs, and then 300 bar hauling jobs at the end of it.


Toss in a cart system with automatic dumping and the cost of the smelting operation relative to the dumping operation now goes through the roof. The rubble dumping becomes trivial compared even to clearing rooms now, but the smelting cost remains relatively high, and the benefits relatively small.

[Martin]

The reaction should take the rubble, and produce the same amount of rubble and an insignificant quantity of whatever metal.

I thought of that too, but again, assuming that you'd only ever do this with magma at your disposal, why wouldn't the furnace operator just shove the useless rubble at the end down the waste chute in the magma forge and be done with it? Whey create another hauling job to toss it into the same magma that you just smelted it with? I'd be fine with it, but it seems - silly. Makes perfect sense for that to happen from a non-magma furnace though.


I know that some people view magma as something of an exploit, but it's generally damn hard to efficiently work into your fortress. My current fort has a 141 z-level pump stack to get it up to embark level that had to pierce one underground lake - and I route that magma anywhere that refuse tends to pile up to minimize hauling, and it's key to my metal operation as I have no coal and few trees. So, I think it's reasonable for magma to have a real benefit.

[NW_Kohaku]

I think you're falling into a logical trap there. Smelting rubble would only be viable if you had access to magma due to its low yield. But if you have access to magma, you already have a solution to the rubble - just toss it in the magma. If you take that as the default solution when magma is available, then smelting doesn't change anything - except give you the ability to trade labor for a bit of metal.


And clearly you didn't read my explanation for how it'd work. I said quite explicitly that my proposal would give out metal in proportion to its existence in the biome layer. If there's no iron in the layer, you get no iron. Let me make it clearer: if you excavate every tile in the layer, the amount of metal you would get from smelting all of the non-ore in the entire layer would be identical to the amount of metal you would get from smelting the ore from that layer. So if you excavate 10,000 stone from a single layer of a 100x100 tile embark (about a 2x2) and you get 200 copper ore and 100 silver out of it, and therefore 200 copper bars and 100 silver - if you smelted the remaining 9700 stone as gravel, you'd get an additional 200 bars of copper and 100 silver. It'd require 32x as much labor and fuel to double your yield. With magma, the fuel is free, but the labor remains. If you think that's a good deal - then go for it. But instead of 9700 hauling/dump jobs to the magma, you'd generate 9700 furnace operator jobs to the same magma, plus 300 hauling jobs for the resulting bars. You run into a parallellization problem that you don't have with the dumping in that you can probably task 50 dwarves with dumping, but you're unlikely to have 50 magma smelters constructed and 50 furnace operators. In that case, in order to clear you fortress, you're probably facing 9700 hauling jobs to clear, and an additional 9700 smelting jobs, and then 300 bar hauling jobs at the end of it.


Toss in a cart system with automatic dumping and the cost of the smelting operation relative to the dumping operation now goes through the roof. The rubble dumping becomes trivial compared even to clearing rooms now, but the smelting cost remains relatively high, and the benefits relatively small.

Part of that was that it should preferably be the magma sea.

Also, not everyone was arguing your proposition, but a more general one. 

I also don't believe that we should be letting sandstone possibly start producing some platinum because there's platinum in an igneous layer on the other side of the embark, several layers deeper than the sandstone, and if we are to have a generic rubble type, there is going to be not tagging where that stone came from. 

However, I suppose you are right on the rest of that front.  If we made it possible to dump into some sort of magma strainer for recovering some ore very slowly from very large magma workshops, it wouldn't be terribly outside the general premise that I was arguing for. 

I would, however, like to go back to the idea of having some sort of volcanic eruption meter, where if you dump large volumes of items into magma (or smelt rubble, in this case), then it will eventually lead to pressurization of the magma pipes or magma sea, and possibly result in a workshop suddenly having a backflow of magma up into the furnace floor, or otherwise generating excess magma that you'll have to divert somehow.

[The Bard]

Again, nothing is being taken away from anyone here, so I don't see why people seem to take this idea as a personal insult.  You can still have fun doing construction set type activities with all the options on or off you personally choose to have, just as you can personally choose to have SPEED:0 dwarves and use danger rooms or else impose self-imposed limits like not using any traps or walling anything in and building on the surface for more challenge with sieges.

Time is being taken away unless it's easily togglable; either in game, or with modding every new release. And all for literally no benefit, based on your insistence that we not be allowed to 'get rid of' it by having uses for it. All it does is add a pain in the butt to normal operations.

It's like having aquifers that don't provide/wick infinite water: all cost, no benefit.

[Sadrice]

Many people disagree with your concept of benefit.

Anyways, I like martin's system for rubble smelting.  I object to one I believe has been proposed I which absolutely any stone is smeltable, and it's a reasonable way to dispose of rubble.  If you're using magma anyways, that does make sense to combine the jobs.

For overfilling the magma sea, I would assume they would be like aquifers, but it might be interesting to limit drainage, so that there is a set magma height, and if you raise or lower it, it will slowly equalize.  That way you could dump a certain, reasonably large amount of rubble into the magma sea each year, but if you exceed that you risk magma flooding.

[Manveru Taurënér]

Time is being taken away unless it's easily togglable; either in game, or with modding every new release. And all for literally no benefit, based on your insistence that we not be allowed to 'get rid of' it by having uses for it. All it does is add a pain in the butt to normal operations.

It's like having aquifers that don't provide/wick infinite water: all cost, no benefit.

Just the prospect of having a filling material that could create "rubble/amalgam walls" would be very much worth it to a lot of people, and it'd also be useful to those that want to turn their embarks into a wasteland of rubble, as has already been suggested. Also counting those of us that would just enjoy having it in place for a more intricate mining system, I'd hardly call that "no benefit".

[NW_Kohaku]

Maybe if you could build 'natural' walls with it, I might be convinced that it was worth putting up with slower mining.

But otherwise, this adds nothing for me. I have enough trouble coming up with enough time for DF as it is, and I'm not in it for patience challenges or simulation. I just wanna make my animal !!SCIENCE!! forts and aboveground castles with massive, deadly arenas and this would just result in making my arenas probably no longer worth the headache.

And don't tell me that's not a game. It's my game. It's my fun.

Time is being taken away unless it's easily togglable; either in game, or with modding every new release. And all for literally no benefit, based on your insistence that we not be allowed to 'get rid of' it by having uses for it. All it does is add a pain in the butt to normal operations.

It's like having aquifers that don't provide/wick infinite water: all cost, no benefit.

Actually, I'd ask what the benefit is to building a "massive aboveground castle"? 

Is there an in-game benefit to that aboveground castle that could not be served by a smaller one underground?  Why can't you just use the Arena Mode for your animal testing?

Or do you simply enjoy building an aboveground castle because it is enjoyable to overcome the challenge of building a castle and having a big, showy monument? 

If we want to get philosophical, what benefit is there in playing Dwarf Fortress or much of anything we do in life if two hundred years from now, we, and everyone who remembers us will be dead?

There are people who see a benefit to logistics and rubble, even if you don't.  I'm glad you can build big aboveground castles and be happy with that, but it's not something I feel a need to do.

I don't understand the point of an "I'm so busy, I have to get this needless giant castle built NOW" argument, when the point of the game should be to enjoy it along every stage, not just once it's built.  There are still many people who play this game for the game aspects, not just the ability to have a monument at the end.